Anybody else see a rainbow at midnight on a transatlantic plane?

Factual Questions
1

I dunno if this should go here, or MPSIMS, or IMHO, but since it is a scientific
phenonmenon I guess it should go here…

I’ve been to Europe twice now and both times (both flights were during the night)
sometime in the middle of the night a beautiful rainbow appeared due north in the
summer twilight (this was June BTW) on the other side of the world. What was
eerie about it was that the brightness was rather muted and the colors were
silhouetted against the almost-dark sky. I remember pointing it out to my sister
(I always grabbed the window seat), who mumbled something and went back to
sleep.

Guess I could have dreamed it, but anyone else see anything like that in a plane?
Consider the thread boundaries to encompass any strange atmospheric sights
while airborne…

2

Sure it was a rainbow, and not this?

3

Other possible candidates are a glory or a moonbow. (Where was the moon when this was happening, anyways?)

4

Colors too bright for a moonbow. Could have been a glory, except the sun was below the
(“northern”) horizon. I’m guessing light was refracted from the sun via high-altitude ice
crystals over the horizon.

5

Belt of Venus?

6

Squink, you might want to go look up the link you wanted: you linked back to the OP.

Here is a Belt of Venus link, but I do not know if it was the one you intended.

7

Close, Squink but the colors weren’t like a sunset, but were clearly differentiated.

I’ll be sure to sit on the port side of the plane on my next trip to Europe (next year) and get
some pics and get back to y’all.

8

Wow that’s wierd! It takes me to a reply to topic page, with the OP quoted. I thought links like that expired after an hour or so.

Anyhoo as my link was supposed to show, there’s quite a bit of variation in the appearance of the belt of Venus.

You say “due north in the summer twighlight”. Was the sun below the horizon in that direction too? That’d allow the possibility of all sorts of different ice halos. The circumzenithal arc in particular can be pretty colorful.

9

Webb Pierce explains it in song:

After the war was over, I was coming home to you
I saw a rainbow at midnight, out on the ocean blue
The stars in heaven were shining, the moon gave its light from above
I saw your face in this rainbow, it made me think of our love.